On Sunday, the Pittsburgh Steelers (2-1, AFC North) played the winless Tampa Bay Buccaneers (0-3, NFC South) and were stunned by a late TD to lose the game to the Bucs. Let’s recap the NFL action in this exciting matchup!
The Tampa Bay QB Mike Glennon passed to receiver Jackson for 5 yards and a TD with just 7 seconds left in the game to beat the Steelers 27-24 and register the Buccaneers first win for the 2014 season. They were given this chance by the Steelers, as the media says from sloppy play by Pittsburgh, thus the Bucs took advantage of the situation.
The amazing tale in the game was WR Murphy, who jobless until his signing last week with the Bucs, seized the opportunity as had 6 receptions for 99 yards and was an important cog in this 1st win for Tampa Bay.
A key factor in the loss to Tampa Bay by the Steelers was they can’t seem to stop from beating themselves as their undisciplined play making led to accumulating 125 yards for 13 penalties, with six were of 15 yards of which two were for bad conduct, and last week that had 11 penalties and their coach Tomlin acknowledged that it was becoming problematic for the Steelers. But remember that on this day both teams accumulated some 22 penalties, so there were a lot of flags thrown in this game.
The statistics, except for the penalties were very similar as the Steelers had 27 first downs on 73 plays for a total 390 yards (305 passing & 85 rushing), while the Buccaneers had 21 first downs on 64 plays ( 287 passing & 63 rushing), with each team scoring 10 points in the first quarter, Bucs 7 points in the 2nd, both had 7 points in the 3rd and the Bucs won the game in the 4th quarter with 4 points and the final Bucs 27 Steelers 24.
It was just last week that the Tampa Bay team lost to the Falcons by some 6 touchdowns, but they responded this Sunday by rallying in the 4th quarter to win the game and give Coach Smith his 1st win for his 2nd NFL coaching job who did not coach during the 2013 season.
Buccaneers QB Glennon in his first start of 2014 completed 21 of 42 passes for 302 yards and 2 touchdowns while being intercepted once and sacked once. RB Martin had 14 carries for 40 yards and 1 TD while their receivers combined to 10 receptions and 164 yards and 1 TD.
Steelers QB Ben Roethlisberger completed 29 of 40 passes for 314 yards and 3 touchdowns and was sacked once, and on the game, became the 12th quarterback of go over the record 35,000 passing yards completed. RB Bell had 19 carries for 63 yards and receivers had 17 receptions for 216 yards and 3 touchdowns.
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers, now 1-3 (3rd NFC South) will play at the New Orleans Saints, now 1-3 (3rd NFC South) on Sunday, Oct. 5th 2014, and with both teams in the same stance it should be interesting. The opening odds for those that bet on NFL at an offshore sportsbook, the Saints are favored at -10 ½ with Ov/Un at 48 in the 1:00 PM game.